Is this dad entering the middle stages?

[CeeCee1]

My dad does not have a formal diagnosis of Alzheimers as such but he definitely has it. It started very gradually 2 years ago and has, in the last few months got a lot worse. My dad is 84, my mum 79 and she is really struggling to cope- with the physical care he needs, the isolation, the lack of conversation. Until very recently, just a couple of weeks ago, she was adamant she could manage. She is now desperate for help and in her words is a prisoner. I live close by and see them every day, sort all the appointments etc and do all i can, my sister see's them and my brother, who lives 250 miles away does a fortnightly round trip to take dad out for a few hours to give mum a break. I am currently dealing with the carers centre as mum is now ready to have an assessment.
Anyway, it's been a bad weekend for them. It's so hard to write this and I feel so bad for dad saying this but yesterday, for the first time ever, he soiled himself. He wasn't aware but we smelt it and after a lot of coaxing we checked him and it was everywhere. It took mum, me and my 13 year old son to shower and clean him and redress him. It was so hard doing that because my dad would have been mortified if he had capacity to think his wife,daughter and grandson had had to do that. We put it down to a one off but when I visited today, my dad had obviously wet himself, his trousers were soaked. He was again completely unaware and my poor mum was so upset as she said she had been reminding him to use the toilet all day. Is this the middle stage of dementia? Has my dad become doubly incontinent LITERALLY overnight? It's so frightening.

 

[canary]

Im afraid that incontinence is indeed a symptom of progressing dementia, but it is unusual for it to develop so quickly. It can happen, but I would check to see if he has a urine infection which can often cause havoc and make dementia symptoms far worse

 

[CeeCee1]

Im afraid that incontinence is indeed a symptom of progressing dementia, but it is unusual for it to develop so quickly. It can happen, but I would check to see if he has a urine infection which can often cause havoc and make dementia symptoms far worse

 

[CeeCee1]

Thank you for your reply. It did briefly cross my mind that maybe he had an infection. I will encourage mum to.make an appointment for him.

 

[Jassac]

My dad does not have a formal diagnosis of Alzheimers as such but he definitely has it. It started very gradually 2 years ago and has, in the last few months got a lot worse. My dad is 84, my mum 79 and she is really struggling to cope- with the physical care he needs, the isolation, the lack of conversation. Until very recently, just a couple of weeks ago, she was adamant she could manage. She is now desperate for help and in her words is a prisoner. I live close by and see them every day, sort all the appointments etc and do all i can, my sister see's them and my brother, who lives 250 miles away does a fortnightly round trip to take dad out for a few hours to give mum a break. I am currently dealing with the carers centre as mum is now ready to have an assessment.
Anyway, it's been a bad weekend for them. It's so hard to write this and I feel so bad for dad saying this but yesterday, for the first time ever, he soiled himself. He wasn't aware but we smelt it and after a lot of coaxing we checked him and it was everywhere. It took mum, me and my 13 year old son to shower and clean him and redress him. It was so hard doing that because my dad would have been mortified if he had capacity to think his wife,daughter and grandson had had to do that. We put it down to a one off but when I visited today, my dad had obviously wet himself, his trousers were soaked. He was again completely unaware and my poor mum was so upset as she said she had been reminding him to use the toilet all day. Is this the middle stage of dementia? Has my dad become doubly incontinent LITERALLY overnight? It's so frightening.

My mum is incontinent, sometimes doubly, many times I wash her, she doesn't realise she has done anything, the best time was when she had poo right up her back, goodness knows how it got there. She wears disposable pants and pads, perhaps you can get your dad some.

 

[Cazzita]

Yes, it's a horrible thing to happen to anyone and horrible to deal with too. It happened to my mum seemingly overnight too. I have got used to dealing with it now, with pull-up Tena pants and cleaning up mess etc but oh, the indignity! Awful disease

 

[myss]

It took mum, me and my 13 year old son to shower and clean him and redress him. It was so hard doing that because my dad would have been mortified if he had capacity to think his wife,daughter and grandson had had to do that.

Oh @CeeCee1 welcome to the forum. I'm sorry to hear about your dad.and the shock ut has been for you and your family. I was just writing on another thread that if my dad could see how his toiletry habits have descended to, he would be absolutely repulsed by it.

And of course it is awful and can be emotional to handle as a relaitve carer, especially for children of the pwd as the role is reversed in that they were once the one who were checking and seeing you've wet/soiled yourself when you were a baby and now I'm doing that for him. I think at the time we realised his incontinence, we had our eyes opened by other behaviours at that point (I had thought at the time that the wandering was the worst symptom) that the incontinence wasn't as big as a shock, it was just another mountain that we had to climb.

With my dad the incontinence was a gradual thing. We noticed the times he asked to go toilet, then not uriniating in the toilet properly, then wetting himself despite prompting, then not using the toilet properly, and so doubly incontinent.

We've been to the local incontinence service (called Bladder and Bowel Service in my area) to obtain advice and products to help him, so you could think about doing to same if you have not done so already. Some of the advice was good but admittedly the products we got seem to be the lowest level of basic which wasn't worth using until we did some research and made some changes. We also buy tena pants now as they're very handy to use at short notice.

 

[Rosserk]

Thank you for your reply. It did briefly cross my mind that maybe he had an infection. I will encourage mum to.make an appointment for him.

Don’t wait for an appointment. Ring his doctors tell them it’s possible he has a urine infection and might need antibiotics. This happened with my mum. I rang and told them my mum has dementia, I am informing you now she needs a home visit right now as she is a vulnerable adult and you are responsible for her welfare. The doctor was there the very next day! He gave her antibiotics just in case it was an infection. He said they wouldn’t harm her if she didn’t have one. Tell them you will hold them responsible if anything happens to your mum, they may even put your dad in hospital for a while to give your mum a break and they will help with the incontinance.

Good luck big hugs x

 

[Millie12]

I wonder about incontinence. mum is in a care home, but twice recently her trousers have been wet when I arrived. She said she had sat on a wet chair each time. Technically she could have sat on a we chair outside, but twice seems unlikely. Thoughts please.

 

[Izzy]

I wonder about incontinence. mum is in a care home, but twice recently her trousers have been wet when I arrived. She said she had sat on a wet chair each time. Technically she could have sat on a we chair outside, but twice seems unlikely. Thoughts please.

Good morning @Millie12 and welcome to the forum.

Have you had a chat with the staff about whether this has happened at other times? There's every chance that it's incontinence as that is often part of the progression of dementia. There's also a chance she has a urine infection as UTIs are common in people with dementia. I would ask for the staff to get the GP to check that out.

 

[canary]

I wonder about incontinence. mum is in a care home, but twice recently her trousers have been wet when I arrived. She said she had sat on a wet chair each time. Technically she could have sat on a we chair outside, but twice seems unlikely. Thoughts please.

People with dementia who become incontinent usually have no idea what is happening and come up with all sorts of explanations about why they are wet - some of the theories can be quite amusing! I expect that the chair was wet - but not before she had sat in it!

 

[Cobber]

Hi, mum has recently become bowel incontinence after quite a long while of balancing constipation/diarrhoea. Now not sure whether to call gp or not, they always come out and are very kind but always say without tests, she screams if blood taken etc, best leave her alone. Also we buy tena pads is it worth having nhs pads? If they are of poor quality? She is in position, as many are, house rich but not alot in cash, just over government limit, so can pay and would rather if quality poor, less hassle and just about coping ad it is.